Which ideas and developments will transform our society or the relationship between society and individual in the future?

Nobody can foresee the future and still all of us have very different ideas of what it could look like – or should look like. The talks at TEDxKIT 2017 tackle questions such as: Which ideas and visions exist with regard to our social, societal or economic development? Which new forms of living are evolving? In which direction is mobility moving? Will new forms of working transform our life? How will we communicate? Which developments will permanently inﬂuence relationships between people? Which developments are fundamentally changing the political landscape? Get ready for an exciting afternoon!

19:15

Afterhour

21:00

Audience Activities

The founders of the StartUp Kinemic (since 2016) developed a form of gesture control, which analyses movements by means of a so-called wearable. A sensor bracelet or a smartwatch is used to capture arm movements, which the company’s software then turns into control commands. Thus, the user can navigate menus by making sweeping movements or writing words in the air. The basis for the software was developed at KIT.

For the augmented-reality sandbox the software, which was developed at the Institute for Data Analysis and Visualization of the University of California Davis (UC Davis), must be downloaded and a depth camera similar to a first-generation Kinect installed above the sandbox and then calibrate themolded surface outlines of the sand hills and dales with respect to the projector. In a second step, a projector shines the proper imaging texture onto the surface: Low regions are filled up with virtual water, hills are given a shade of color, as a function of their altitude, which ranges between earthy lowlands, green areas, and peaks covered white.

Dr. Sven Wursthorn of the Institute of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing

At the Institute of Anthropomatics and Robotics of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) Professor Alex Waibel and his team developed the first computer-based automatic simultaneous translation service at a university worldwide.
The lecture translator combines the technologies of automatic speech recognition and statistic machine translation in an integrated system. Auxiliary components structure the text, deal with punctuation, treat German compound words, record the lecture, and display the translation result. The components are combined by an innovative service infrastructure.

In his talk, Thorsten Bauer addresses the fusion of reality and virtuality. With his artist collective Urbanscreen he develops media installations on a global scale, including the Karlsruher Schlossfestspiele, the Dock Festival in Hamburg and projects for the opera in Sydney. Their form of video projection incorporates real buildings and is called Lumentektur.

Space and Sound

Benoît and the Mandelbrots see the laptop as their main instrument; they are mainly dedicated to live coding, the process of writing software in real time. They use the programming language as an expressive interface between man and machine in order to improvise sound and music. The laptop musicians are connected via a network, enabling them to communicate, synchronize, and share data.

Torsten Kröger

ROBOTICS AND AI

Torsten Kröger

Robotics and AI

Torsten Kröger’s talk will provide an overview of recent developments in robotics, with a special focus on machine learning and humanoid robots. Torsten Kröger believes data-driven algorithms are a forward-looking trend, i.e. algorithms which infer from data how to act correctly, for example in the areas of visual perception or voice recognition and -translation. According to Kröger, these approaches will lead to new opportunities and applications in robotics, which were not realizable before.

Biography Torsten Kröger

Torsten Kröger is founder and former CEO of Reflexxes, a startup that commercialized software for deterministic robot movement planning in real time. In 2014, Reflexxes was taken over by Google, where Torsten Kröger was responsible for robot software and also coordinated research activities between DeepMind, Boston Dynamics, Google Research, and X until 2017. In the spring of this year, Torsten Kröger was appointed Head of the Institute for Anthropomatics and Robotics of KIT.

In his talk, Martin Lehmann-Waldau – a trained lawyer and mediator – introduces a method he uses in couples therapy. Through mindfulness and open interaction, he helps people to live in relationships unaffected by outdated role expectations. According to Martin Lehman-Waldau, we can only be mentally present, if we pay attention to our bodies.

Biography Martin Lehmann-Waldau

He studied mediation at the Centre for Non-violent Action, Baden. Additionally, his work is influenced by the hypno-systemic approaches developed by Dr Stephen Gilligan and Dr Stephen Paul Adler. He spent many years in South Asia (Himalaya), organizing trekking tours and working as a free journalist. Thus, he is experienced in intercultural work and dealing with group dynamics under stress.

Christoph May talks about the power of male fantasies – and how we can break it. Using the American film industry as an example, he demonstrates how impactful these stories are and how fast they spread. His aim is to challenge (ideas of) manhood.

Biography Christoph May

In 2016, Christoph May founded the ‘Institute for Men’s Studies’. He holds workshops and presentations on start-up-manhood and radicalisation, on violence in speech and misogyny. He writes a blog and is currently working on his PhD thesis with the title ‘Graffiti – of Men and Walls’.

Ute Schepers

ORGANE PER 3D-DRUCK

Ute Schepers

3D Bioprinting Human Organs

Biochemist Ute Schepers from the Institute of Toxicology and Genetics at KIT talks about her spin-off company vasOlab. She and her team aim to change the way drugs are developed by speeding up experiments and avoiding animal testing. VasOlab’s ‘Body-on-a-chip’system with miniaturized human organs, based on artificial blood vessels and 3D bioprinting, has already won over many experts – for example at the Cyber Champions Award 2016.

Biography Ute Schepers

Ute Schepers is group leader at the Institute of Toxicology and Genetics (ITG) at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. She studied chemistry in Bonn, did her PhD in biochemistry and habilitated at KIT in 2011. In 1998, she became a research associate at the department of cell biology at Harvard Medical School. Since 2001, she has been doing research on organspecific molecular transporters, tissue engineering and vascularization of 3D tissues. Her research group developed the prototype of the vasQchip. She initiated the foundation of vasQlab and still supports the spin-off as member of the advisory board.

OPEN TECHNOLOGIES

Christoph Schneider

Open Technologies

Christoph Schneider talks about future societal potential of open technologies. He is interested in the openness of the future and how knowledge and technology entangle in shaping the future. Research, especially technology assessment, should engage in contests for better (techno-social) worlds, he says.

Biography Christoph Schneider

Christoph Schneider is co-founder of FabLab in Karlsruhe. From 2012 until 2017, he worked as research assistant at the Institute for Technology Assessment and Systems Analysis at KIT. In March he completed his Ph.D. at the Munich Center for Technology in Society of the Technical University of Munich (TUM). Since April 2017, Christoph Schneider works as Post-Doc at the Chair of Sociology of Science at the TUM.

Body and Senses

Analogous to Thorsten Bauer’s talk, dancer Piotr Tomczyk will turn sensory impressions into visible movements in his Butoh-Performance ‘Memories of the skin’, which premiered at ZKM. His performance will be accompanied by a projection created by the artist group Urbanscreen. A most radical dance performance, which places the body at the centre of sensory perception.

COMPLEX ARCHITECTURE

Christian Tschersich

Complex Architecture

As senior architect in the internationally operating LAVA office (Laboratory for Visionary Architecture), Christian Tschersich deals with buildings as complex systems. His work as a lecturer focuses on generic parametric design. His talk is about how a more comprehensive understanding of the main factors of our (built) environments can lead to high-performing architecture that meets future demands. Drawing on examples, he will demonstrate which innovative projects are – and could be – possible.

Biography Christian Tschersich

Christian Tschersich is project leader in the renowned architect’s office LAVA in Berlin. LAVA designs everything from master-plans and urban centres, to homes made out of PET bottles to ‘reskinning’ aging 60s icons, from furniture to hotels, houses and airports of the future. He studied architecture at KIT, and currently works as a lecturer at the KIT Department of Architecture and the CIEE GAD in Prague.

When he was 15, Marius Wrobel followed his friends to a ballroom dance lesson; at uni he then discovered his passion for Salsa. Many years and competitions later, he explains in his TEDxKIT talk, why gender equality should finally find its way into dancing. His credo: the gentleman doesn’t lead in couple dance, he dances with his partner. The lady doesn’t follow, she dances with her partner. Couple dance, as a meeting between two dancers, gains creative variety and musicality through individual freedom of choice, based on equal dance competence.

Airport Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden (Baden-Airpark)

The buses available at Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden Airport will take you to the train stations of Rastatt or Baden-Baden where you will find trains leaving to Karlsruhe. The Baden-Airpark-Express line will take you to Karlsruhe Hauptbahnhof.

There are various ways to reach Campus North or Campus South by bus or tram. The exact times of departure are available on the website of Karlsruher Verkehrsverbund.